Which format is better?

[Clannad_92]

okay, first of all, i dunno if this is the right place to post...

now, i have question...
about FLAC vs MP3 vs WMA...

i wanna know which is better in terms of bass sound and overall...
the thing is, i read that WMA is better than MP3 (dunno about FLAC)...and i wanna know about them...

if able, i hope that you all response ASAP as i want to download some music...

[datora]

.
For best sound, you want lossless.  That means, NEVER converted to any lossy format, such as MP3.

Sound files with full capture of all original detail are something like *.wav.

However, *.wav files are pretty large.  There is a way to reduce the filesize on those so that no information is lost at all ... called lossless compression.

The best overall lossless compression format these days is called *.flac.

You want FLAC files for the best reproduction possible.

Just make sure that nobody ever took an MP3 file and turned it into a FLAC ... all that accomplishes is to make the file larger, but it is still missing all the data that was deleted to create the MP3.

A fairly quick google search for "what is FLAC format" will turn up quite a lot of pages with excellent information.  The Wikipedia has several excellent pages to get you started.

FLAC format can be played natively from WinAmp or foobar, two excellent music players.  If you use WinAmp, download the light version with minimal garbage and install it with only music playback options.

[Freedom Kira]

If you are a casual listener, you don't really have to bother with FLAC or any other lossless format like .wav, mentioned above. Just go with mp3. You won't lose any "bass sound" or anything - you will lose sound quality in a different way, but the tradeoff is that your mp3 file is compatible with pretty much every music player out there, while all other formats don't have as much widespread support.

WMA is not recommended mostly because it's an obsolete format and not well-supported. I'm not sure if it's actually better than mp3 or not in terms of quality.

Anyway, as a summary, lossless codecs like FLAC are for preserving sound quality and intended more for audiophiles and archivers. If you just want to listen to music, make it easier on yourself and just use mp3.

[Slysoft]

ogg vorbis. at q3 it still sounds the same as a 320kb mp3 but 1/3 the file size.

you won't notice a difference with flac no matter what they tell you. the only difference is due to using a crappy encoder

[vuzedome]

WMA lossless.
Why?
Personal preference, that's why so don't try to shove that shit down my throat just because I am different.
If not, FLAC.
But to be honest no one will offer WMA lossless because there's FLAC.

[Clannad_92]

so FLAC is good bcause it preserve sound quality?
Interesting...thank s all...

[halfelite]

if you want lossless i would choose flac over WMA loseless any day for compatibility reasons, most AVR's, audio players will play FLAC very few will play WMA loseless. if you are using this to listen to music in the car go mp3 as you wont get the enjoyment of going FLAC.

[krumm]

Better is subjective.  For me size and compatibility with out losing noticeable quality is the best, for someone else losing even unnoticeable quality is bad.  I consider well encoded mp3's the best for my needs.

[Hadouken]

Flac is good since it's versitile (can transcode to any other format). Other than that, I can't really see a reason to get it over MP3 V0 or V2.

[kitamesume]

1) MP3 - most, if not all, affordable portable players supports it. small in size so you could put a whole lot of songs on the player, quality is still great since i doubt you'd be bringing a 500$ headpiece with you.

problems : lossy format. thats it.

2) FLAC - lossless, not as large as wav. good for archives and occasional listening if you want pure quality.

problems : pretty big in size. not every songs has a flac version available. theres only a few portable player that supports flac. needs a really good headpiece and soundcard to be appreciated.

[nstgc]

I rip all my CDs (yes I actually buy music) as FLAC as well as AAC. AAC is much better than MP3.

[Tatsujin]

so FLAC is good bcause it preserve sound quality?
Interesting...thank s all...

Yes. If you have some good or high-end speakers - on the plus side, for maximum sound quality, you want a good sound card and real speaker cables for pure quality - and to notice the real difference between lossless vs. lossy. If you got some shit speakers/audio-output/cables then you can go with MP3 or Vorbis.

1) MP3 - most, if not all, affordable portable players supports it. small in size so you could put a whole lot of songs on the player, quality is still great since i doubt you'd be bringing a 500$ headpiece with you.

problems : lossy format. thats it.

2) FLAC - lossless, not as large as wav. good for archives and occasional listening if you want pure quality.

problems : pretty big in size. not every songs has a flac version available. theres only a few portable player that supports flac. needs a really good headpiece and soundcard to be appreciated.

^ What this person said.

[Bob2004]

If your player is capable of playing it (most are these days), then I'd recommend going with Ogg Vorbis (*.ogg). It's basically the same as MP3 in function, but is generally better in pretty much every way. It can match the quality of an MP3 file at as little as a third of the filesize in many cases, and it's a free and open-source format to boot, which is always nice.

If your player isn't capable of playing .ogg files for some reason (ie. if you use Windows Media Player or something - Winamp, Foobar etc, and the vast majority of poratable devices, such as Android, fully support it), then yeah - go with MP3 instead.

[Pentium100]

real speaker cables for pure quality - and to notice the real difference between lossless vs. lossy.

Of course, assuming the speakers are at least 1kW, otherwise, regular cables are enough, they just need to be thick enough, that's it.

Interconnect cables need to have good shielding, but they do not really need to have 100MHz bandwidth.

[kitamesume]

^actually, the length of wire needed is the deciding factor if you need a cheap cable or a good cable, because longer wires has a higher chance of picking up noise. plus longer wires has higher impedance and resistance =p

[FlyinPenguin]

I rip all my CDs (yes I actually buy music) as FLAC as well as AAC. AAC is much better than MP3.

Same here. I rip all my CDs in FLAC and put them on my server for distribution to my HTPC and Archos 5. I then re-encode certain albums to AAC for some of my smaller flash based players such as my smartphone.

[mgz]

so FLAC is good bcause it preserve sound quality?
Interesting...thank s all...

Yes. If you have some good or high-end speakers - on the plus side, for maximum sound quality, you want a good sound card and real speaker cables for pure quality - and to notice the real difference between lossless vs. lossy. If you got some shit speakers/audio-output/cables then you can go with MP3 or Vorbis.

1) MP3 - most, if not all, affordable portable players supports it. small in size so you could put a whole lot of songs on the player, quality is still great since i doubt you'd be bringing a 500$ headpiece with you.

problems : lossy format. thats it.

2) FLAC - lossless, not as large as wav. good for archives and occasional listening if you want pure quality.

problems : pretty big in size. not every songs has a flac version available. theres only a few portable player that supports flac. needs a really good headpiece and soundcard to be appreciated.

^ What this person said.

tatsu speaker wire has been proven to make very little difference, they have taken tons of audiophiles and played music over the "nicest" speaker wire money could buy and over the same speakers with clothes hangars and people couldnt tell the difference.

Just getting decent speaker wire that isnt the thin as fuck shit that comes in like HTiB is all you need

[x5ga]

If you have a good sound system, go for lossless formats. FLAC will give you a reasonable compression rate/decoding speed ratio and also it's highly compatible with a lot of devices... including some portable MP3 players (tho I dunno why you'd put lossless files on a device with limited space, but if you want, you _can_). APE has better compression at the cost of decoding/encoding speed, and it's not that compatible... some players don't even play it (get foobar btw). TAK has all the advantages of FLAC and APE, except I don't even know of a player that supports it besides foobar and winamp, and even those, with 3rd party plug-ins only.

As for lossy formats, and MP3 vs. WMA, I remember a blind test (or was it double blind?) made by an independent research company, and WMA _kinda_ beat MP3 at (subjective) sound quality, at both 64kbps and at 128kbps. Which is expected since the actual base of the MP3 format is almost 20 years old. WMA is only about 10-12 or so, and WMA Pro is kinda recent (few years old). AAC beat them all btw. At all tested bitrates. So, go with that if you can.

[vuzedome]

Audiophiles... 
And when they start arguing about the objectivity of a subjective test, boy oh boy.
I stopped using the "not this shit again" picture but I guess I should have put it up on my first post in this topic.

[x5ga]

yeah, audiophiles are elitist bastards... like every other -philes ;3

Anyway, in real world, if you use an onboard sound card and you bought your headphones at the local grocery store from next to the potatoes, you won't be able to tell the difference between a 16bit 44khz 128kbps MP3 and 24bit 96KHz FLAC. Justin Beaver will still be crap, no matter if it's at 16kbps 8bit mono MP2, or in Dolby TrueHD. Also, bass frequencies compress well so they usually sound good no matter what format they're in. MP3 has problems with high frequencies tho, it tends to cut them off.

Just download a few FLAC songs, compress them with your fav. encoder, and see if you can tell the difference. I usually get FLACs if I can find them, but even with what sound system I have, it's sometimes hard to tell the difference between lossless and a well-made lossy compression.